Laughter
by SoTotallyOsm
Summary: Ellis one-shot. Ellis finds something to entertain himself with besides killing zombies.


"Grabbin' a ninja sword!" The young man named Ellis proclaimed. They'd finally left the safe room that led into the mall, and he'd busied himself with finding a new melee weapon while the others emptied lead into the onslaught of infected. The entire time he was in the hotel and in the streets, he'd used an axe to take down the infected people who tried to kill them. He'd always said he'd wanted to be an axe murderer before. Guess he got his wish now. Of course, he did use his shotgun every now and then when some kind of "special" infected managed to rear its ugly head.

The mall was fairly dark; most of the corners and hallways having busted out lights and such. Wood and clothing littered the floor, along with broken glass from when the Green Flu originally broke out. It goes without saying that in times of trouble people tend to resort to stealing necessities. Sometimes, though, people would try to steal things that didn't seem to matter much in present time anymore such as: television sets, games, cell phones, and other sorts of electrical appliances. There was hardly enough electricity to keep what few lights worked anyways. Besides... When you turn into a mindless zombie-like being, you don't really remember how to use a tv or a video game platform.

The other members of his "team" decided to spread out to look for supplies. They'd found a few molotovs and bile bombs, but nothing they could use for themselves. Ex: pills or adrenaline shots. They had run out on their way through the massive horde that attacked them at the convenience store not too long ago.

"Hmm.. Well whadda we have here?" Ellis gripped the handle of the sword, getting a good feel for the sturdy material he would soon use to slice open some zombies with. He held it in one hand, using the other to point his flashlight into the dark abyss of the corners. He moved by a glass case and some wooden shelves to find a few infected just hobbling about. Of course, the closest one was alerted of his presence as the light shone into its face. Ellis' lips curled into a big grin as he raised the sword with semi-amateur experience and swung it down across the infected's chest. It didn't take long for it to fall unceremoniously onto the tiled floor, the sound alerting the other two stragglers that were leaning against the wall in front of him.

"Boy, this has got to be more fun than the time me 'n Keith went coon huntin' together." He chuckled, realizing how far he'd strayed behind without the group. He climbed over the glass case and sauntered over to them, showing off his new prized sword that had fresh blood coated on it from his previous attackers. Rochelle merely smiled at him while Nick and Coach didn't seem to pay much mind to him.

They made it up the escalator, having fought through a new horde of infected that somehow knew they were there. It seemed no matter how quiet they were... If they stayed in one place for too long, zombies just came out of nowhere to get them. Sometimes it made the mechanic wonder just how many people had to be infected by now. He'd sworn that he'd seen more people in the past few hours than he'd even known in his life! And that was saying something, considering he knew everyone down by five blocks from his house, to the people who came to his shop, plus those people's families and friends. In short, he knew a LOT of people, yet these infected/zombies/whatever just came out of nowhere and never seemed to end. Not to mention he didn't really recognize many of them. But maybe that was a good thing, after all.

Once on the second level and the group had cleared out a good number of infected, Ellis' eyes lit up at the site of so many mannequins standing around. To him, they were just calling for him to tear them apart. It made for good practice with his sword, right? Nobody was really paying attention, anyways. He jumped up onto a short desk that held two mannequins and a small supply of ammo for a near-by pistol and idly tightened the arms of his mechanic's jumpsuit around his waist. See, if he could aim this way... he could probably do more damage than the way he tried earlier. Yeah! That's right. The sword raised into the air again, a small glint shimmering across the bloodied surface before he sliced into the mannequin. It fell over, giving a satisfying clatter, and left the lower half remaining. He quickly raised a boot to kick it over as well, quickly turning around to attack the second which was positioned on the other end of the desk.

"Hahaha..!" The fake body fell apart once more and he received a wary look from Coach who was nearby with his own shotgun. The large man gave him a look that could only be described as a 'what the hell do you think you're doing, boy?' expression. Ellis gave him a meager shrug, grinning and hopping from the desk. However, when the ex-football coach walked away, Ellis' grin spread even wider and he ran off behind the other shelves to massacre the other remaining mannequins he could find. Clattering and the sounds of hard plastic breaking were heard from the dark depths of the mall's vast area as well as... Ellis' laughter? It was something of its own, the way he laughed. It wasn't like his laughter when he was happy, or his laughter when he was nervous or the pained laugh he'd pull when he got injured. No, this laughter was something of a maniacal sense. Either Ellis was having too much fun "killing" the fake dolls, or he was going crazy.

This manner of laughter and separating from the group to attack the fake bodies continued through their trek through the mall. Even when Nick was constricted by a Smoker and a Charger had thrown Rochelle off of the top of the escalator, leaving Coach to be pummeled by it, Ellis did not stop his crazed attack. Of course, once he was done he realized the serious trouble he would be in for indulging in his own version of fun. Freeing Nick wasn't hard, but it did take them a while to kill that Charger and pick up Rochelle who was being overwhelmed by a group of infected at the bottom of the escalator.

"Just what the FUCK were you thinking, Overalls?" Nick's expression was one of pure confusion, disbelief, and hate mixed into one.

"I'unno. Thought it was fun at the time..." Ellis gave a meek laugh and a sheepish smile to the gambler.

A/N: Wrote for my cousin who likes to play as Ellis. He had a katana and ran around without the group to kill EVERY mannequin he could find in the mall. The most hilarious part of it was that Ellis would laugh when he hit them. So I told him I would make him a short fic for it, since it made us laugh every time. Edited for a few typos.


End file.
